Family-Run Bed-Stuy Businesses Ravaged By Fire Need $50K

BED-STUY, BROOKLYN — Two family-run businesses that have stood on Nostrand Avenue for more than a decade are in danger of closing after a fatal fire next door left them with a "tremendous" amount of damage, according to a GoFundMe.

Amir Deli and Grocery and Crown Halal Chicken and Pizza — located at 357 Nostrand Ave. — were forced to close when flames erupted in the building next door on Feb. 7 and have not reopened since, according to the fundraiser.

"We all have put our blood, sweat, tears, and years into this businesses [sic] and this building," wrote campaign organizer Asif Riaz. "This property going into disrepair would mean the end of our lives as we knew them."

Asad Chaudhary, the building owner, arrived in Bed-Stuy more than 30 years ago from Pakistan with "not much more to his name than his clothes," the fundraiser states.

With help from his brother, Asif, and two sons, Asad and Ahmad, Chaudhary became a fixture in the neighborhood and a source of support for local Muslim community, providing free catering during events at the neighborhood mosque, according to the GoFundMe.

Chaudhary and his family run the chicken restaurant and a Yemini family leases and runs the deli, organizers told Patch.

"Our families rely on these jobs to put food on the table," the GoFundMe states. "And when possible, to put food on the tables of those in more need than us."

But the families have been unable to conduct business as usual after a three-alarm fire at 394 Gates Ave. reduced the building next door to rubble and prompted the Department of Buildings put both businesses under a vacate order, photos and city records show.

It took 130 firefighters to put out the massive blaze and two bodies were later discovered in the debris, according to officials and reports.

Now the business owners face about $50,000 worth of damages — they'll need to replace kitchen equipment and hire a structural engineer, architect and a contractor —and their tenants are without a place to live, according to the online fundraiser.

"After these grueling years of COVID ravaging our businesses," Riaz wrote, "the burden of the repair costs are simply more than we can bare."

The GoFundMe had raised $38,000 as of Tuesday.